21 October 2006

@misc@

The Optimus Upravlator is up on the Art. Lebedev Studio website, confirming that, as I wrote, button clicks are registered seperately for each side (plus all four sides at once, for a fifth function). Much more unexpected, though, is that the device is a single 10-inch 800x600 screen with buttons overlaid onto it — keeping production costs in check. It should really be a great product, for graphics designers, or gamers, or just about anyone.

Not available before the second half of 2007 (at best). Damn.

@misc@

Nvidia to create x86 CPUs (I don’t know how to capitalize that name — I think it used to be nVidia, but now it’s all-caps, and I don’t do all-caps).

This is a very weird idea. I see where the decision — or rumor — is coming from: with AMD and ATI merging (and Intel making GPUs too), the market for integrated CPU+GPU chips is going to get bigger by the minute, and Nvidia is right to be afraid of being left out. But starting a new x86-compatible chip from scratch? Considering how strong the competition is, and how much development that entails, I have big doubts that would be a winning strategy.

@windows@

Word is that Internet Explorer 7 is finally out. I have no idea how my various websites look with it — I suppose #FF00AA should look better than it used to, but I don’t dare hope that it would work perfectly.

Quick Tabs (Exposé for MSIE tabs) is associated with Ctrl-Q. What the hell?

@apple@

I always wondered why iTunes couldn’t determine a track’s BPM (beats per minute) and use it in playlist creation and whatnot — particularly for Party Shuffle. Enter Tangerine: it analyzes your iTunes library, detects BPM and beat intensity for each track, and then create playlists to your specification — e.g. a workout playlist with a progressively accelerating beat, or a regular party track with smooth rhythm variations.

I don’t think I’m going to test it much before I post this (as explained by the screenshot below), but it should be awesome if it works correctly, and I can’t see any reason for it not to. I still wish the functionality was integrated directly into iTunes, though — I’d love to be able to click a button at any time during Party Shuffle to ask it to progressively increase BPM by 20 over the next six songs, for instance. Here’s hoping the iTunes team buys this technology, too.